50,195 Final Word Count

I just finished writing my novel for National Novel Writing Month and I almost cried when I was done.

Not so much out of how beautiful the prose was at the glorious denoumont or anything, but at the sheer amount of ungraceful determination and aggravation it took to write one hundred single spaced pages in 30 days.

To be more accurate- 22 days, three days off for a shoot, one day off for Thanksgiving and driving from LA to San Francisco with my girl, and one day off for…I don't know…I was probably blocked or something.

It's going to be a long road until I've finished revising it and the manuscript is in any place to show to anyone, but rest assured there will be much touting and shouting and well, maybe not too much rhyming and miming, thank god, but you'll hear about it I'm sure.

Oh yes, did I mention that I have a very full, very obnoxious beard? There's that. I hate it, but I said I was going to write a novel in a month and by god, I did it in 22 days. I also said I was going to grow a beard in a month and by god, I did that in like, 8 hours on November 1st. If I find any good pictures I'll post them.

Or you can come out and see my beard in action at my band, Townland's first gig. Saturday, the December 8th at 9PM. Check out our myspace page for details. Myspace.com/townland

The only other remaining item of business is the matter of my reward. I told myself that I was going to by a new television if I finished the novel…and now that I've done it, I guess I need to make good for myself, right? I'd kind of like a flat-panel HDTV, about 20" I guess. I know there are cheap flat panel LCDs that aren't HD, but that's my quandary- I don't really have any use for HD- no cable or network, no PS3 or HD DVD player, just a standard def DVD player and Playstation 2. But I'm thinking that if the world is changing to HD, I should stand up and change with it right? Write? Anyone?

I'm so tired.

Never Going Back

I just spent the last two nights with my girlfriend watching "Cheaters" on DVD, uncensored, and I will never be able to watch it on television again.

What? You aren't familiar with Joey Greco and the Cheaters Detective Squad? Holy shit, you poor human. Cheaters is a television show like COPS, only for people being unfaithful to boyfriends/girlfriends/spouses. Someone hires the Cheaters private investigators and they snoop around and find out if the person is cheating or not; however, if they are being aired on the show, they are ALWAYS cheating. Then, the host, Joey Greco, takes the one being cheated on and they confront the cheater. The production crew almost always times the confrontation to perfectly occur mid-coitus, offering the maximum of tossing the naked chick off the dudes' lap in a shower of pillows, sheets, and g-strings, and the resulting screaming match happening with full frontal nudity.

The thing is- it's always blurred and bleeped on television. Once, about a year ago, my girlfriend and I saw the greatest episode ever which involved a S&M dungeon and black latex and baby clothes. But after watching the uncensored version, I don't think we will ever be the same.

We were watching The Best of Cheaters Volume 5, which included, plenty of fights, meth heads, these two black lesbians that were trying to kill each other and my a dude opening up a paintball gun on the camera crew (you could hear the cameraman grunting from each paintball hitting them, but they kept on filming).

Also, here is my favorite line from the "interview" portion of Cheaters, as they are introducing the woman who hired them:
Fat Mexican Girl: if I find out that he is cheating on me....[sniffle]…I'm going to kill him. Out of love.

If you're wondering what to get that person in your family that loves Maury Povich, Jenny Jones, and owns all the Jerry Springer: Too Hot for TV videos, Cheaters is the gift to give this holiday season. You will not be disappointed by it.

A brief break from writing to write about writing

I'm well over halfway done with my NaNoWriMo novel and I'm feeling pretty "eh" about it; to the point where I know that it's going to be a mess when I get back in to the editing process and rewrite the intro to match all the inane plot twists I have since written.

But I'm having fun and if I'm not crazy-busy, I'm usually cranking out two to three thousand words a day. By that figuring, I'll be wrapping up shortly after the holiday this weekend, unless by some miracle, I get inspired while I'm up in Sebastapol with my girl. Which I suppose is quite possible.

Also, in news about writing, I heard a piece on the radio today where Jeff Bezos was talking about the Amazon Kindle, their eBook reader and interestingly enough, Amazon's first tangible product.

Many of you know that I have a severe book addiction and I love reading and writing all sorts of media: comic books, magazines, newspapers, blogs, Sedaris, etc. I love all of it. So when I heard Time Magazine's Man of the Year 1999 Jeff Bezos talk about this "revolutionary" new product I was intrigued. His interview was fascinating and the NPR correspondant had some great questions regarding how you can make reading an eletronic device like reading a book.

While Bezos talked about the eInk they use and the way the machine works, is linked to the Amazon book store (like iTunes, the 90,000 eBooks they have are all $9.99) wirelessly, I started to get excited. When Bezos said "people love to sit down in the morning and read the paper," saying they will have newspapers available on the Kindle I got really excited.

This seemed like a gadget I could really get into and could possibly be my new best friend, even at the steep $400 price tag. As long as they include RSS, for easy, free acesss to blogs and such, I would preorder in a second.

But alas, this is a tragic story- the four honge is only the beginning of the priace you would have to pay. Newspaper and magazine subscriptions* would cost about $15 a month, and EACH RSS BLOG SUBSCRIPTION would cost $2, instead of the ZERO DOLLARS I pay to read them on NetNewsWire at home or abroad on my laptop.

Also, when I finally got online and took a look at it, the thing looks kind of lame. Not horrible, not without tought and ergonomic intelligence- just bleh. It looks more like a gadget from twenty years ago, a handheld Apple IIe, than something that is supposed to be an iPod for books.

Not only that, but the competitor, Sony's Reader may look better, but is more stupid and less intuitive and has less features expandibility.

Anyhow, that's where my nerd is at- someone recommend something super cool and nerdy for me to pine over this holiday season. Something useful, yet expandable. Come on now, I know there is something I don't know about.




*e-Ink doesn't support color YET, so how can you do magazines?

You don’t understand

My mind has been blown. FOR REAL.

You don't get it. Lucha Vavoom was a fucking UNBELIEVABLE experience. A few friends invted my girlfriend and I to the show on October 30th. I posted the pictures right away, but it's taken me a week(I've been busy- see other blogs), to get around to posting these.

Nothing to say, just amazement. Also, I took some awesome pictures and some not so awesome pictures and if you make it to the bottom, there is video.

For the full Flickr set (92) photos: OBEY LINK


Little Chicken arrives in a Hot Rod; the procession before the show that occurs out front is amazing. Clown cars, hot rods, busty beauties, El Chupacabra harassing the Little Goat, yeah, awesomeness.


Blurry Babes Waiting for the Show to Start


The show begins with some female on female double team action.


Goddamn right.


Yes you are.


I cannot explain this picture. You just have to see it live.


One of the Crazy Chickens looking on as his bro is about to get suplexed.


Look out, Little Goat!


Chupacabra gives the thumbs up to us, as Felino looks on.


Just a fan.


Chupacabra vs. Cassandro


Chupacabra making his move…!

And then my camera's memory was full up. I took that many pictures.

But I did get these videos too.

Lucha VaVoom - clip 1

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Lucha VaVoom - clip 2

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Lucha Vavoom is the best night of the year in Los Angeles. I am living proof.

Quickie Update from NaNoWriMo and NaBeGroMo

So apparently, on day 3 of National Novel Writing Month, a whole bunch of people were done! What? You already wrote 50,000 words in three days? I'm no slouch, I'm no workaholic, and I could probably lay down 6,000 on a phenomenal day, that would be the max that I could do creatively and coherently. But 17,000 words in a day for three days straight? Doesn't that really take the fun out of it; shouldn't these people be signing up for National Novel Writing Week?

I'm at 6100 words out of 50,000 which is fine, I could be doing more, but I could certainly be doing less, like I had the first two days. Things are rolling now and I feel comfortable for the next few days with the plot that I need to lay down.

Also, I've decided to grow my "writin' beard" out during this month. Unfortunately for me, I hate facial hair, so we'll see how long this lasts before my girlfriend dumps me or I give in to the Gillete.

That's it. I've got time this week to work on this but things are going to get hairy later in the month when I need money and have to start working again. I've got to be at 8300 by the end of tonight.

Dia de Los Navidad Muertos

Yesterday I worked with my friend Sarah on a commercial. It was at a really nice studio space literally ten feet from the Pacific ocean and connected (weird to have a sound stage connected like this) to a delicious deli that did the catering. Pretty cool.

What wasn't cool- was that I did more Christmas decorating in a single 12 hour day than I have in MY ENTIRE LIFE. I fucking trimmed a tree. On top of that, i was forced to all the attention of the hippies in Venice berating me for "getting into the spirit a little early aren't we?"

At the CVS up the street purchasing wrapping paper, the manager patted me on the shoulder and said, "Alright! Getting started early this season eh young man?" Who was I to tell him that I didn't celebrate his precious Christmas and looked upon the whole holiday season with scorn and disdain.

And then, wrapping out the set, I walked outside with the unreturnable mini tree that I had spent the morning hanging tiny ornaments on(shudder), and this woman on her bike yelled at me, "Wow, you sure are getting that Christmas tree out early aren't you, kid?!" I didn't respond, as I was heading to the dumpster to drop the thing on the growing pile of felt snowflakes, plastic covered pinecones, and splintered nutcrackers.*

That's how that works. I can't wait for Thanksgiving.




*Splintered Nutcrackers is playing live at the Wiltern this weekend.